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Sunday, December 14, 2014

Scale insects swarmed the oak's branches until it looked as if they would overpower the oaks. Then, the scale insects' enemies showed up in droves to conquer the scales. The scale insects' strategy was to multiply in overwhelming numbers. Their enemies' strategy was to one by one infect, eat, or destroy as many scale as possible. Who won the battle?

Here in this photo, the scale insects cover an oak branch and a Twice-stabbed Lady Beetle is laying eggs on the scale insects. Its larvae will feed on the scale insects.

Fungal
entomopathogen spores landed on the scale insects' cuticles and infected many of the scales,
eventually killing and digesting them.

These two photos show fruiting-bodies growing post-mortem out of the parasitized scale insects.

Other enemies of the scale insects were several species of
tiny parasitic wasps.These next few
photos show some of these parasitoids laying eggs on the scale insects.

The tiny wasps had a big job scurrying around over the
hordes of stationary scale insects and selecting suitable ones where they would lay
their eggs.

The wasps' larvae developed inside the scale insects as
they fed on the scales or the scales' eggs.

Here is a photo of a scale insect shell with plenty of exit
holes from the mature wasps.

In this epic battle for the oak branches in a forest near me, hordes of scale insects were attacked by wasps,
the entomopathogenic fungi, and the larvae ofbeetles like the Twice-stabbed Lady Beetles...